Arts Centre Melbourne and Melbourne Symphony Orchestra presents Satan Jawa

From Indonesia's most celebrated director, Garin Nugroho, comes Satan Jawa, a newly commissioned silent feature film steeped in Javanese mythology with a live score by Australia's Iain Grandage and Indonesia's Rahayu Supanggah featuring a thrilling blend of Western symphonic tradition and Indonesian gamelan music. Satan Jawa will be a feature of Asia TOPA and will be performed at Arts Centre Melbourne's Hamer Hall on 24 February 2017.

Nugroho's Satan Jawa evokes Javanese mythology through the genre of contemporary horror as inspired by the perennial silent film classic, Nosferatu by Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau. The film explores Indonesia's pre-orthodox Islamic stories of the seven deals man makes with the devil in order to gain wealth and the live score dramatically underpins the mysticism and sensuality of Nugroho's tale of love and sacrifice.

"Satan Jawa is one of the most ambitious works created with Indonesian artists for the international stage, a collaboration with living legends Garin Nugroho and Rahayu Supanggah whose back catalogue of collaborators include Peter Sellers, Robert Wilson and Kronos Quartet," explains Satan Jawa's Creative Producer and Arts Centre Melbourne's Asia TOPA Associate Director Kate Ben-Tovim.

"Garin's film is mesmerising, with a lush visual style drawing on his favoured themes of Javanese mysticism, magicrealism and sensuality with a knowing glance to the horror genre. The live score (co-written by Iain Grandage and Rahayu Supanggah) delicately blends the sounds of contemporary Javanese gamelan with Iain's theatrical orchestral writing style."

"Over two years in development, Satan Jawa has been a bold artistic journey for MSO and Arts Centre Melbourne and we are thrilled to present the premiere of this work for Asia TOPA," she added.

About the creators
Garin Nugroho's beautiful, unusual and expressive films have led to his reputation as one of the most critically acclaimed and unique filmmakers of our time. Since 1991, he has produced and directed eight features and five documentaries, including Opera Jawa (Requiem from Java), a 2006 Indonesian-Austrian musical film directed by Nugroho which features traditional Javanese classical music and dance in a setting of opera. The film was commissioned for Peter Sellars' New Crowned Hope festival in celebration of the 250th anniversary of the birth of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. It was then screened at several film festivals, including the Venice Film Festival, the Toronto International Film Festival and the Vancouver International Film Festival before a theatrical release in the UK and The Netherlands.

Considered one of the pioneers of contemporary music in Indonesia, Rahayu Supanggah's work spans major international projects including, Peter Brook's Mahabharata (1994), Robert Wilson's I La Galigo (2004) and a collaboration with the American string ensemble, Kronos Quartet.

A professor of ethnomusicology and composition, he is an internationally acclaimed musician, composer, performer, and curator who seeks to explore, experiment, and create new musical genre. After obtaining his doctorate in ethnomusicology from Universite de Paris VII (1985) he became an artist-in-residence in New York (1991), Paris (2003-2006), London (2007-2010), and Seattle (2010), he went on to collaborate with well-known directors and musicians including Warner Kaegi, Robert Wilson, Sergio Leone, Rhoda Grauer, Alec Roth, Neill Sorrel, Alain Recoing, Toshi Tsuchitori, Ong Ken Sen, Ramli Ibrahim, Denisa Reyes, André Gingras, Kronos Quartet, Sardono W. Kusuma, Marseli Sumarno and many more.

Iain Grandage composes, conducts and performs - he has received the prestigious Sidney Myer Performing Arts Award, the Ian Potter Emerging Composer Fellowship, and been Composer-in-Residence with the WA Symphony Orchestra, and Musician-in-Residence at the UWA School of Music, where he is currently an Honorary Research Fellow. He has won five Helpmann Awards for his work in the theatre - for best original score (Cloudstreet, The Secret River, When Time Stops) and for Music Direction (Little Match Girl, Secret River) and six Green Room awards. His concert works are regularly performed in Australia and overseas, and he enjoys longstanding collaborations with The Black Arm Band, Gurrumul, Meow Meow, Tim Minchin and Eddie Perfect.

Satan Jawa is a featured performance in Asia TOPA: Asia-Pacific Triennial of Performing Arts, a new festival-style celebration of Asian-focused performance and culture, from the hottest contemporary performance to the boldly iconic and sublimely classical, presented over four months from January to April 2017.

Featuring some of the most anticipated contemporary performance makers and thought leaders from the Asia-Pacific region, Asia TOPA will position Melbourne firmly on the Asia-Pacific cultural map in terms of innovation, new ways of working and exciting inter-cultural commissions and collaborations. Further programming details will be announced in late September.

Arts Centre Melbourne and Melbourne Symphony Orchestra present
Satan Jawa
24 February 2017
Arts Centre Melbourne, Hamer Hall

Director Garin Nugroho
Composers Rahayu Supanggah (Indonesia), Iain Grandage (Australia)
Creative Producer Kate Ben-Tovim (Turning World)
Producer Jala Adolphus

Satan Jawa is a co-production of Arts Centre Melbourne and Melbourne Symphony Orchestra for Asia TOPA: Asia-Pacific Triennial of Performing Arts. Asia TOPA is a joint initiative of the Sidney Myer Fund and Arts Centre Melbourne and is supported by the Australian and Victorian Governments.
The film was commissioned by Arts Centre Melbourne with funds provided by the Sidney Myer Fund. The score was co-commissioned by Arts Centre Melbourne and Melbourne Symphony Orchestra with support from Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade - Australia Indonesia Institute.
This project was supported by DFAT Australian Cultural DiplomaCy Grants, Australia Council and Australia Indonesia Institute.

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